


Cultural Differences

by grainjew



Category: Pocket Monsters | Pokemon (Anime)
Genre: Gen, also axew and tepig are there but they dont say anything, but please imagine me crying while i go on about how much i love ghost types, i dont know HOW it doesnt come up in this fic, the litwick came on screen in this episode and i physically teared up
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-31
Updated: 2019-03-31
Packaged: 2019-12-29 22:35:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,311
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18303200
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/grainjew/pseuds/grainjew
Summary: Coda to Best Wishes episode 26, "Scare at the Litwick Mansion!"Cilan wants to know why Ash was so ready to ally with Team Rocket. Iris is wet, miserable, and trying not to take it out on her friends. Ash really needs to stop dodging questions. (Pikachu, stop helping him.)





	Cultural Differences

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kagehana_tsukio](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kagehana_tsukio/gifts).



> people: the unova anime is bad and iris is annoying!!!!!!!!!  
> me, gathering this gremlin 11 year old into my arms: how dare you insult my dumbass daughter she just radiates ~younger sibling trying to prove they’re the mature one~ energy  
> (ash, in the distance: you’ll have to pry my backstory out of me with a crowbar!!!!)
> 
> this fic is dedicated to tsu bc we've been watching bits and pieces of unova together and also she looked up timeline stuff for me thanks tsu

It was still raining. Iris poked at her hair — Axew was alright in there — and then poked at her face — still definitely alive, which was nice — and then sat down dismally. The ground was sopping even in this hollow tree, but at least they weren’t being rained on, and at least they weren’t dead. All things considered they were doing pretty good.

Iris spared a moment for a mean-spirited thought about how _she_ would be alright in the rain on her own, but not Ash and Cilan, _they_ were too sheltered, and then she put the thought away, because it really wasn’t helping anything. Sure, she could get on on her own, but Cilan’s cooking was too good to miss out on, and Ash had kept being more experienced than she gave him credit for until she finally started giving him a little credit. Getting a pokeball thrown at her head had, maybe, left a bad first impression.

She was being unfair and she knew it, and she was also cold, and damp, and her and Axew and Ash and Cilan and Pikachu had just almost died, and she was kind of a little bit miserable.

She deserved her moping time.

They all deserved their moping time.

...if the way Ash had just let his Tepig out of its pokeball was any indication, they were not going to get their moping time.

“Hey, Tepig, think you can warm us up if we get too cold?” asked Ash, smiling at it like it was the only thing that mattered in the world.

“Tepig!” said Tepig, and curled up in his lap.

“Thanks, buddy. We’re counting on you!”

That was… a surprisingly practical move, from someone as reckless as Ash. Even if it was decently hard to get hypothermia from Unova’s summer rainstorms. Iris almost opened her mouth to say either of those things, and then thought better of it. No use praising him and correcting him at the same time. They’d just start arguing, and she was too busy being miserable and damp to argue.

Cilan spread a jacket on the last bit of slightly-less-wet ground and sat down delicately, as though he wasn’t already drenched.

Ash leaned his head out of their hollow tree and tried to catch raindrops on his tongue.

Iris moped. Ash brought his head back into the tree and shook out his hair. Cilan stared at Ash.

“So, Ash,” said Cilan, a bit delicately, “what was up with you and those Team Rocket people earlier?”

“Whad’you mean, what was up with us?” asked Ash. He was carding his fingers through Tepig’s fur; Pikachu had taken note of the discussion and was standing on Ash’s shoulder, leaning up against the side of his head.

“You were pretty quick to truce with pokemon thieves constantly after your partner,” said Iris, because Cilan really had a point.

Cilan nodded. “Not to mention how you saved their life and then they saved mine? The whole situation had quite a distinct flavor.”

“Oh,” said Ash, then shrugged. Pikachu grabbed his hair for balance. “Eh… I mean, they’re terrible, but they’re not bad in a pinch. We’ve truced before.”

Iris waited for him to expand. When it got clear that he wasn’t gonna say anything else — what, did he think he could get away with just dropping hints like that? — she said, “When?”

“Oh, here and there,” said Ash, waving the hand not busy with Tepig. “I think the whole mess at Shamouti was the first time, right, buddy?”

“Pika,” disagreed Pikachu, waving a paw in the same way Ash had.

“Ohhh, right, the St Anne,” agreed Ash. “That was _ages_ ago, I almost forgot somehow.”

Cilan frowned, and while Iris was busy trying to find a way past her indignation at Ash not answering her question at _all_ , he asked, “Shamouti? The name has a familiar aroma.”

“It’s in the Orange Islands. We were there a few regions back.” Ash made a face. “Wasn’t fun.”

“Pika pi _ka_ ,” agreed Pikachu, vehemently.

Cilan frowned. “I don’t believe I heard about it as a vacation destination, but…”

Iris leaned in, put her chin in her hands. Axew shifted in her hair. She had a _very_ important question to ask. “What kind of dragons do they have there?”

“Uhh,” said Ash. Iris contemplated the fact that every interaction she had would go so much smoother if the whole world shared her enthusiasm about dragon-types. Then Ash’s eyes lit up. “Oh! The Champion had this _super_ cool dragonite! It was _so_ strong, too!”

“Wow! I’ve always wanted to meet a dragonite!”

“They’re awesome!”

“You travelled through Kanto, too, right? What other kinds of dragons have you met?”

“Well—”

“Ash, Iris!” said Cilan, waving his hands in their faces. “Not to turn off the stove just as your water begins to boil, but we’re getting a little off-topic.”

“Oh, sorry, Cilan.” Ash tilted his head. “...what was the topic, again?”

“It can’t be more important than dragon-types,” muttered Iris.

“Team Rocket,” said Cilan. “Ash, I hadn't realized you'd known them so long?”

Ash made another face, and Pikachu mimicked it without looking. “Yeah, met ‘em on my first day out, practically.” Tepig shifted under Ash's hand, half-asleep, and he smiled at it. “I hate them, but it'd be almost weird without them, y'know?”

An ill-aimed gust of wind blew a shower directly into their hollow tree. Iris rubbed water out of her eyes and processed what Ash had said.

“No, I don't know!” she exploded, shaking water off her hair as she moved. “If I kept running into people who tried to steal Axew, I'd, I’d— You're such a kid!”

Pikachu _looked_ at her, and Iris felt a little bad, and also remembered all over again how wet and miserable she was. “Pika _chu_.”

“Don't be _mean_ , Pikachu,” said Ash. “She just doesn't know ‘em well enough yet!” He gestured. “There haven't been any, uh, _situations_ , yet. Hopefully there won’t be any!”

“Situations?” asked Cilan.

“Eh,” said Ash. “My luck sucks.” They waited, but he didn’t add anything.

“What does _that_ mean?” said Iris, practically ready to start yelling again. Ash could be so— so frustrating! Cilan had called it cultural differences with a knowing smile on his face that one time but that was definitely not it. She’d never met anyone else from Kanto but they couldn’t _all_ be this vague, could they?

At least her outrage was making her less cold. She could see why Axew had learned the move! A wonderful addition to any dragon-type’s repertoire.

“It’s true, his answer does have all the ingredients for avoidance,” said Cilan. A branch cracked in the distance. “But I’m sure he’ll tell us someday. Won’t you, Ash?”

But Ash had already moved on, staring blankly out off their hollow tree into the rain. “So litwick evolve into lampent, like Trip had, huh?” He didn’t wait for a nod to start grinning. “Unova has so many awesome pokemon! Like, deerling, how they change with the seasons? _So cool_. And emolga! They fly like any flying type but can zap almost as bad as Pikachu! And even those litwick, I’ve never seen anything like them! They’re amazing!”

“They almost killed us,” said Iris flatly. Maybe if they were _dragon-types_ she’d understand, but…

Ash threw his arms out wide. “Doesn’t make them not cool!”

Pikachu sighed into his hair. Tepig rumbled in its sleep. Iris put her face in her hands and left it there.

“Axew- _axe_ ,” commented Axew.

Rain drummed down.

“Looks like we’re going to be stuck here for awhile,” said Cilan finally, digging through his bag. “I’ll put together some snacks.”

“You’re the best, Cilan!”

Well, food was more important than Ash being vague and frustrating. Iris grinned into her hands. Cilan’s cooking was _delicious._ She was definitely willing to let the discussion die for _that._

**Author's Note:**

> i love ghosts. iris is so 11 and also so incredibly just ash but with dragons and the character development of like, idk, johto ash not unova ash. shes adorable and an utter disaster please love her


End file.
